Transportation vehicles, for example, aircraft, trains, buses, recreation vehicle, boats and other similar vehicles use various computing devices for providing various functions, including entertainment, system control, content storage, and other functions. These computing devices include hardware (for example, servers, switches, network interface cards, storage adapters, storage devices and others) and software (for example, server applications, operating systems, firmware, management applications, application programming interface (APIs) and others).
Transportation vehicles today have individualized functional equipment dedicated to a particular passenger seat, which can be utilized by a passenger, such as adjustable seats, adjustable environmental controls, adjustable lighting, telephony systems, video and/or audio entertainment systems, crew communication systems, and the like. For example, many commercial airplanes have individualized video and audio entertainment systems, often referred to as “in-flight entertainment” or “IFE” systems.
Public announcements (PAs) are routinely made on transportation vehicles. The systems presenting PAs on a transportation vehicle may have to adhere to certain software design assurance levels. For example, on aircraft, the system presenting PAs may be required to meet a software design assurance level, Level D for example, as described in DO-178B and DO-178C, Software Considerations in Airborne Systems and Equipment Certification, published by RICA, Inc.
This can be challenging for the software/hardware providers that may be executing other software applications at a lesser design assurance level, Level E for example, or a lesser assurance level than Level D. To meet Level D, the software/hardware providers may have to upgrade and change software code for different applications. This is commercially undesirable and burdensome. Continuous efforts are being investigated to develop technology for processing PA announcements with Level D assurance, while other software applications continue to be executed at Level E.